


The Bloom of Guilt

by sunfish_sunfish



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, kinda dropped I'm sorry, kinda hectic lots of dialogue, where Hawk Moth's identity is revealed during combat?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 14:09:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15074819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunfish_sunfish/pseuds/sunfish_sunfish





	The Bloom of Guilt

"No, Chat Noir! What-!"

Clang. Metal met metal as the ring clattered on the floor. The magic drained from him, and Adrien fell to his knees.

The scarlet fingers froze at his shoulder.

"You… You?!" Adrien felt dizzy as a guttural roar meshed with a caught cry. But that was the least of his worries.

He stumbled forward as accusations blasted from all sides.

"Why- Adrien!"

"This… This was all for you!"

"Why- what? How could you be?"

"How… betraying your father!"

"Your father is Hawk Moth!"

"All your fault-"

"All my fault-"

"Shouldn't-"

"Should've-"

"I'm sorry-"

"No forgive-"

"Stop… "

"STOP!"

"Chat Noir."

Adrien blinked. The usually slitted emerald eyes gazed at him with an indecipherable expression. "Plagg…"

Plagg flicked his tail silently. In his small paws was the scarred, bland ring.

Adrien gazed down at the shattered black mask of Hawk Moth and then slowly raised his eyes towards the man tied by the yo-yo. The strained veins popping as the mouth vomited slews of something vicious. The eyes that deep down, in the coldest pit of the abyss, held absolute nothingness. If nothingness was a state, then even that had been burned away to become more nothing than nothingness itself.

That was his father.

"I wanted to free you, I wanted to make you the child your mother would be proud of and you, you did everything wrong! You were a mistake, I should've disowned you and adopted a more willing son because you are nothing but a sham, you only look like that woman, you bastard!" Hawk Moth snarled. "I hope you realize that, and regret for the rest of your life for being born. Atone being alive!" Hawk Moth wrenched against the ropes, and Adrien flinched as something dark began staining from beneath them.

Plagg flicked his ears. The ring glinted dully.

"What will you do? Are you going back? Will you forgive?"

Adrien looked down, a blush crawling along his neck.

"Adrien, look at me." He looked up and met enormous, glowing green. Green like an apple… that's what mother would compare it to, Afrien thought absently.

"What are you."

I… I…

"Empty, that's what! That's what he is!" Hawk Moth spat. "My boy, I made him everything that he is! Without me, that thing would be nothing, nothing, you hear? He has, is, and will always live under me and we'll be the guardians of her memory! And when I die, he'll carry it on, and then after he's dead, we'll be together, all three of us, and it'll be perfect!" Hawk Moth jerked his head back and began choking a rankled laugh, convulsing his throat over and over like when a penguin regurgitates fish for its young.

"NO!" Ladybug shrieked, and she yanked the rope tighter. The laugh broke into wheezes. "No! He won't! Chat Noir, Adrien won't! He'll never die like that! He can't, he can't, he's… I won't let it happen!" Her voice cracked.

I…

"I'll never let Chat Noir be alone! He's mine, do you hear me? He. Is. Mine! I'll never let you have him, you beast!"

"Ha… hahaha! As if! You know nothing-"

"I don't know anything! I know... nothing…" Ladybug stopped pulling, but held the rope taunt. Her hands quivered. "I don't know anything about Chat Noir. I don't know anything about Adrien. But…" She raised her eyes, and the breath was punched out of Adrien's chest. He had never seen her eyes so brilliantly, so royally blue, like the rims of the last summer twilight sky.

"But he is not nothing. He… Chat Noir, Adrien… He is my everything."

Adrien's eyes grew round, and the edges began to burn. His sight began to blur like a Saharan mirage, and all he was sure of, and he knew for the rest of his life he would be sure of, was the blue sky.

"No…" Hawk Moth gaped, searching for words but finding none.

Ladybug closed her eyes, took a shaky breath, and then slowly opened them once more. She took a step forward towards Hawk Moth and dropped on one knee. She let go of her yo-yo. "Nooroo," she whispered.

"No… No, no, nononono NO."

From somewhere. "Yes…!"

"No!"

Black gasps of magic steamed from Hawk Moth, and a single, faint glow spiraled above the mist before fluttering within Ladybug's outstretched palm.

"Nooroo, Lady, at your service." The kwami sweetly smiled up, and Ladybug smiled back, albeit tiredly.

"Noo- Nooroo, you betray me too0!?"

Crawling from beneath the smog was Gabriel Agreste. The Gabriel Agreste. The man from every magazine that Marinette owned, the fashion god that all of Paris and perhaps the world bowed to.

The father of Adrien and… Chat Noir.

Ladybug stood. Her earrings flickered. Please, just a bit longer… Please. "Mr. Agreste. I will have…" Ladybug paused. She swallowed with difficulty before continuing. "have to formally take you to the police. Please oblige peacefully." She placed Nooroo on her shoulder before stretching out the same hand.

Gabriel screwed his eyes towards her, and Ladybug shivered at the malevolent look. She willed her hand to stop shaking and she willed herself no pity for either Gabriel and Adrien. Ladybug closed her eyes. Duty and justice. Even if he hates me forever, even if I know that he has no other family. You have to Marinette, you have to…!

"You forget how I control Nooroo."

Ladybug snapped her eyes open. An unpleasant premonition clenched in her gut. Gabriel had an equally unpleasant smile as he casually stood, brushed off his pants, and towered over her. Ladybug felt Nooroo tremble beside her ear.

Click. Gabriel hung open the brooch at his chest. Ladybug winces as the blood dripped over the photo of Adrien's mother.

"Nooroo, remember… You must come back." Gabriel gazed into the photo, and stroked the photo, further sullying it. "As her previous kwami, you owe it to her after you killed her, yes?"

What.

Ladybug's heart dropped.

"Oh, you don't know Ladybug?" Gabriel gave a bloodless smile as he turned towards her. "Do you know what happens when you're in that appearance Ladybug?"

No, I-I don't want to know. Ladybug took a nervous step back.

"They become immortal. Time stops when you use Lucky Charm and when you transform yes? Same as that, in that outfit, you can never die. A sort of armor." Gabriel's smile widened and curled up to his cheeks. "Maybe it was a sort of thanks by the first kwamis. But you see Ladybug, sometimes it's not so great. To be immortal. And to be a superhero."

"You see, Adrien's mother? She tried to save some stupid people who were in a fire. No Akumas. No anything. But she was too late after trying to find a place to transform. She was too late and when she tried to save them, they were already this." Gabriel stuck his hand into the remaining black smoke, and let it drift away between his fingers.

"So she transformed back in the fire. And joined them."

Ladybug felt horror and nausea rise.

"So you see, Ladybug?" Gabriel continued, as though he had been talking about nothing out of the ordinary. "I'm simply trying to save everyone like this. If you just give up your powers along with Chat Noir and destroy the Miraculouses, then everyone can be happy. And you know what? I'll even give you both my blessing! Go, be together! I don't care anymore! As long as the true monsters are gone."

"What do you say, Ladybug? A good deal isn't it?"

"Um… I… um…" Her brain was short-circuiting. Adrien. Immortal. Dead. Mother. Nooroo. Tikki. Blagg. Ladybug. Chat Noir. Marinette. Marinette and Adri-

"We refuse!"

A lanky arm slung across her shoulders.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes. "What do you want, Adrien?" he hissed. "Stop being a bother and go play with your little ring, kitty."

"Ohhh no, I can't do that. Leave my lady? Here, with a way too intense Batman cosplayer?" A finger was wagged. "Nope, even at Otakon that reeks of one word: Pedo."

"Chat… Chat Noir?" Ladybug stared up at the familiar mask. "O-or, I mean, uh, Adr-"

"Yes, M'Lady! Chat Noir, at your service!" he cut in. He turned towards her and grinned hesitantly. "If… if you'll still let me stay by your side."

Ladybug opened and closed her mouth. Chat Noir's eyes darkened and the grin became a bit sadder. Before she could do a thing, he leaned by her ear. "But that is fine as well," he murmured, and Ladybug felt a different sort of shiver quake up her spine.

"Anyway, stop confusing her ya old geezer!" Chat Noir straightened and gave his usual sneer. "As if you could ever take away her justice! She's greater than anything you could ever throw at her!"

"Try it!" Gabriel hissed, and he raised the photo. "Nooroo, transform me!"

"Ladybug, please save him! I have given you more time-" Nooroo urgently whispered before she was sucked away.

"Nooroo!" Ladybug cried, but it was too late.

Hawk Moth was back for the last time.


End file.
